Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC)

What is the Carbon Reduction Commitment?

The Carbon Reduction Commitment known as the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme is a UK government scheme to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon dioxide emissions in largeprivate and public sector organisations that are high energy users. The CRC scheme is a form of energy tax designed to reduce energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions.

If your organisation (defined at group level, not individual company level), met the following criteria between 1st of April 2012 and the 31st March 2013, it will qualify for CRC:

Has at least 1 settled half hourly electricity meter

Used 6,000 megawatt hours or more of electricity supplied through settled half hourly meters

The CRC scheme operates in phases and we are now in phase 2 which runs from the 1st of April 2014 to the 31st March 2019. Organisation affected by CRC have to register with the Environment Agency at the start of a phase for the entire phase.

A carbon price – Participants must purchase and surrender allowances for their emissions. Allowances can either be bought at annual fixed-price sales, or traded on the secondary market. One allowance must be surrendered for each tonne of CO2 emitted.

Publishing of information on participants’ energy use and emissions

During the Budget in March in 2016, the treasury announced the decision to close CRC following the 2018-19 compliance year, with no purchase of allowances required to cover emissions for energy supplied from April 2019.

Despite the future of abolishment of CRC there is no change as yet to the existing schemes and participants need to implement them as normal until any changes are introduced.

Our service

We offer expert support regarding energy metering in the support of CRC carbon reporting, and can act as an agent on behalf of your company. We can also assist your organisation in entering climate change agreements (CCA) in order to achieve reduced CRC payments.